Hundreds join Castro to protest administration’s separation policy

U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro speaks during the #WhereAreTheChildren rally in support of immigrant children and families at the at the Guadalupe Cultural Center on Thursday, May 31, 2018. Groups participating included the Texas Organizing Project, MALC, and RAICES. less

U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro speaks during the #WhereAreTheChildren rally in support of immigrant children and families at the at the Guadalupe Cultural Center on Thursday, May 31, 2018. Groups participating ... more

Photo: Billy Calzada, Staff / San Antonio Express-News

Photo: Billy Calzada, Staff / San Antonio Express-News

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U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro speaks during the #WhereAreTheChildren rally in support of immigrant children and families at the at the Guadalupe Cultural Center on Thursday, May 31, 2018. Groups participating included the Texas Organizing Project, MALC, and RAICES. less

U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro speaks during the #WhereAreTheChildren rally in support of immigrant children and families at the at the Guadalupe Cultural Center on Thursday, May 31, 2018. Groups participating ... more

Photo: Billy Calzada, Staff / San Antonio Express-News

Hundreds join Castro to protest administration’s separation policy

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In pink glasses and a turquoise dress, Melany Lopez Lucas stood by her mother’s side Thursday evening in front of hundreds rallying at Guadalupe Plaza as her mother recounted the two months they spent in a detention center after crossing the U.S.-Mexico border in 2015.

“Being there scared me because I worried they would separate us,” Melany, 7, said in Spanish afterward.

That fear has become a reality for hundreds in recent months, with U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ early May announcement that parents who crossed the border illegally would be prosecuted and separated from their children while they go through criminal proceedings.

Some three hours north of the border, about 300 people filled Guadalupe Plaza on Thursday night to call for an end to this policy and to demand that children like Melany be kept with their parents as they seek asylum and a life free of violence and gang threats.

“This is very much a call to conscience,” U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro said to applause, his children and wife beside him. “This is about what our nation fundamentally stands for.”

“There is no cause greater than the children of this world,” Mayor Ron Nirenberg reminded the crowd.

The rally was part of the #WhereAreTheChildren social media campaign, which took off across the country after a flurry of news regarding family separations, unaccompanied minors that the government never heard back from in check-up calls and an ACLU report detailing child migrant abuse allegations. Castro was one of the leaders of the effort.

Speaker after speaker urged people to put themselves in immigrants’ shoes, while dozens of children’s shoes rested in a half-circle around the podium. The tiny shoes had Velcro and smiley faces, hearts and stars. There were children’s books, too, and soft teddy bears, gathered to represent the migrant children taken from their parents.

About 700 migrant children were taken from their parents between October and April of this year, news outlets have reported. The Trump administration has said the separation is necessary to deter immigrants from crossing the border, and that this policy is actually more a reinforcement of pre-existing law.

“All we want to do is protect our families,” said Yanira Lopez Lucas, Melany’s mother.

She teared up as she recounted the fearful journey to the United States, only to discover not safety in this country, but more fear.

“We were escaping so much violence in our country, asking for asylum in this country, asking for help,” she said, adding later: “If I would have known that we would be treated that way …”

Lopez Lucas didn’t finish her sentence.

Earlier Thursday, several human rights groups including the Texas Civil Rights Project filed an emergency request to stop the separation of families along the U.S. southern border. The request was made to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, an international agency that investigates human rights violations in most countries in the Americas.

Zenen Jaimes, communications director for the Texas Civil Rights Project, said he expects the IACHR, which operates autonomously under the Organization of American States, to notify the U.S. State Department of its investigation within the next 24 hours.

“It remains to be see if the administration would comply with an order given by the commission,” Jaimes said.

“There is no strand of faith that makes what’s going on OK,” state Rep. Diego Bernal told the crowd that showed up Thursday night on the West Side, holding signs calling for change, hoping their voices will be heard not just here but beyond the rally.

Jessica Azua, a Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipient, approached the podium and held up a pair of blue floral pants, small enough to fit right in with the children’s shoes before her.

She said she wore them when she was 14 and undocumented, crossing from Mexico into Texas.

“Do you see how short they are? I’ve kept them for 13 years now because they remind me of all the struggle and sacrifices of that journey just to bring me a better life,” she told the crowd.

The microphone went out, but Azua raised her voice to a yell, her fist gripping her pants on the podium.